Public discussion held on airport drugs seizure case

IMPHAL, February 11: All Manipur Anti Drugs Association, AMADA and Coalition Against Drugs and Alcohol, CADA jointly organized a public discussion today on the recent case of drugs consignment held from Tulihal Airport.

The program was held at Lamyanba Shanglen, Palace Compound.

It was resolved during the discussion to file a Public Interest Litigation for handing over of the case to an independent agency like the CBI.

The public discussion was attended by president Senior Citizens for Society N Binoy, Senior Advocate Kh Mani, Ex Minister RV Mingthing, Social Activist Dr L Dhanabir Singh, Social Activist N Lancha, Associate Prof MU M Chinglen, Editor Naharolgee Thoudang Khoirom Loyalakpa, Editor Huiyen Lanpao (Meitei Mayek Edition) Shivadutta Luwang and former president Manipur Chemist & Drugist Assn. Ch Shyamjai as presidium members.

Khoirom Loyalakpa, Editor of Naharolgee Thoudang said that even though the case was reported 4-5 times by daily newspapers, unfortunately, the public have failed to speak up on the matter.

He lauded the CADA and AMADA for organizing a platform as public discussion to speak out on the case.

He added that a huge drug consignment was seized from the Tulihal airport recently and that Inspector K Ranjit of SIU who was investigating into the case went on to expose the consignee of the drugs and ended up being victimized.

He said that news papers had reported the involvement of one Henry and Tarpon without their address being mentioned.

It is high time to hunt down these two suspects when their names are already being circulated in daily news, he continued.

In places like Delhi, actions are taken immediately when such news are published in media he said before adding that unfortunately this is not the case with the state of Manipur.

Resolutions were taken at the end of the discussion which include filling a Public Interest Litigation (PIL) before the court, to hand over the case to the independent investigative agency like CBI to pressure the state Govt to truth finding of the case, pressure to re-installation of SIU in Imphal West District and installation of SIU in every districts of the state and to continue democratic agitations further led by AMADA and CADA if their demands are not met.